Gran Turismo 6 announced for PS3

The newest installment of the world's best-selling racer is due by year's end.

Rejoice, PS3 racing fans, Polyphony Digital has some news for you. That’s right—there’s a new installment of Gran Turismo, the world’s most popular console-racing franchise, and it’s (allegedly) coming in time for the holidays. Earlier today at the UK’s Silverstone race circuit, Sony held a "15 years of Gran Turismo” event where it announced Gran Turismo 6 is on its way, and despite speculation that it might be a PS4 title, it’s going to be a PS3 game.

All the existing cars and tracks in GT5 will carry over to GT6, which gains another seven new locations (including Silverstone), as well as roughly 200 more cars. Polyphony Digital has also partnered with the tire company Yokohama and suspension makers KW Automotive to create a new physics engine, something that the game sorely needed after its Xbox rival, Forza Motorsport, did the same with Pirelli. The game will also feature "connectivity with… smartphones and tablets for social and community functions," although there appear to be scant few details on what that actually means in practice. Sony also promises monthly DLC updates with new cars and tracks, although you'll forgive me if I’m somewhat skeptical based on past performance.

I’ll also admit that I'm not sure if I believe the promised 2013 launch date, given that we waited six long years for the underwhelming GT5, which has improved over time but still, in my opinion, remains the second-best console racer on the market. That said, I’m also very much looking forward to getting my hands on the new game to see how one of the most iconic gaming franchises has responded to no longer being top dog. If the graphics in the trailer are anything to go by, it’s going to be even more visually stunning than GT5 (check out the rendering of the KTM X-bow at ~1:05). So come on, Polyphony Digital, knock my socks off!

I still prefer GT series over Forza. Cars just feel more real while driving GT5 (I use a steering wheel all the time). I bought and sold Forza 3 shortly after I bought and been happy with GT5. GT6 will likely be my last PS3 game purchase but it will be a nice one.

I'll believe it when I see it happen. Polyphony Digital is notorious for missing release dates. I remember how many people bought PS3's in large part, for the promised GT5. While the release of GTHD Concept was nice - it wasn't GT5, and GT5 Prologue was just a big tease. We didn't get GT5 till 2010, 4 years after the release of the PS3. So, I'm not going to hold my breath for this till there's a real product on store shelves.

Another comparison - how many iterations of Forza did the 360 see in the time it took to get GT5 to market? Polophony needs to work on their time management issues. Because outside of that, Polyphony deliver quality goods.

I'm happy with that. I'm still pumping in some laps on the Nordschleife every week or every other week or thereabouts in GT5, and if they really have done the right thing and simply added and improved on the base they worked on for too many years already, I expect good things.

GT5 + more tracks + more cars + improved physics? Yes please.

I'll even say that if it's full-price, that is mostly irrelevant to me in this case. I've gotten hundreds, maybe thousands of hours out of GT5 (and its predecessors), which is some pretty decent bang for your buck no matter how you slice it.

I look forward to trying it, but I don't think it'll ever recapture my nostalgic ideal of GT1 and 2. The good old days of doing the high-speed track series over and over again with a Mitsubishi GTO, to get enough money to buy all the other cars...

Also highly skeptical about that release date. Maybe it'll be out for next year's holiday season. As much as I liked the GT series (bought & enjoyed every one up to Prologue), the delay for GT5 led me to get a 360 and Forza 3, which I also enjoyed greatly. They're both very good games, but I needed a proper racing fix and Polyphony took way too long.

It will be pretty funny if GT comes out on PS3 after PS4 launches though.

I'll believe it when I see it happen. Polyphony Digital is notorious for missing release dates. I remember how many people bought PS3's in large part, for the promised GT5. While the release of GTHD Concept was nice - it wasn't GT5, and GT5 Prologue was just a big tease. We didn't get GT5 till 2010, 4 years after the release of the PS3. So, I'm not going to hold my breath for this till there's a real product on store shelves.

Another comparison - how many iterations of Forza did the 360 see in the time it took to get GT5 to market? Polophony needs to work on their time management issues. Because outside of that, Polyphony deliver quality goods.

I remember reading about GT for the PSP prior to the PSP's launch and being super excited for it which must have been sometime in 2004. Pretty much why I bought a PSP too.

Although with this being the PS3's last big year I think they'd better get it done, otherwise it will be ignored.

Polyphony Digital has also partnered with the tire company Yokohama and suspension makers KW Automotive to create a new physics engine, something that the game sorely needed after its Xbox rival, Forza Motorsport, did the same with Pirelli.

It would be nice to see the racing physics approach the quality we've seen in the Forza series.

This is crazy, right? Releasing your premier, exclusive racing game on your last generation hardware during the launch window of your new platform? I understand they're trying to avoid delays, but this just seems so strange.

I imagine PD must be located on an island somewhere, only communicating with the outside world through Carrier Crabs. Because that's the only explaination for why they haven't been trying to get GT6 as a launch title for PS4 since GT5 came out.

I'll believe it when I see it happen. Polyphony Digital is notorious for missing release dates. I remember how many people bought PS3's in large part, for the promised GT5. While the release of GTHD Concept was nice - it wasn't GT5, and GT5 Prologue was just a big tease. We didn't get GT5 till 2010, 4 years after the release of the PS3. So, I'm not going to hold my breath for this till there's a real product on store shelves.

Another comparison - how many iterations of Forza did the 360 see in the time it took to get GT5 to market? Polophony needs to work on their time management issues. Because outside of that, Polyphony deliver quality goods.

I remember reading about GT for the PSP prior to the PSP's launch and being super excited for it which must have been sometime in 2004. Pretty much why I bought a PSP too.

Although with this being the PS3's last big year I think they'd better get it done, otherwise it will be ignored.

I think most of the "kinks" have been worked out for working on 5, and I think 6 sounds like it's more likely to hit the deadline. It also seems somewhat of an iterative release rather than a "big" release, but there's nothing really wrong with that. The question is whether or not it's going to see a release on the PS4 in the near future.

From some of the more hardcore GT fans I know, they'd have little use for a PS4 if there's a new PS3 Gran Turismo. Probably won't affect sales much, but usually, if you have a hardcore audience, you'd rather rope them into your new hardware, rather than give them a reason not to use it (no backwards compatibility).

I'll believe it when I see it happen. Polyphony Digital is notorious for missing release dates. I remember how many people bought PS3's in large part, for the promised GT5. While the release of GTHD Concept was nice - it wasn't GT5, and GT5 Prologue was just a big tease. We didn't get GT5 till 2010, 4 years after the release of the PS3. So, I'm not going to hold my breath for this till there's a real product on store shelves.

Another comparison - how many iterations of Forza did the 360 see in the time it took to get GT5 to market? Polophony needs to work on their time management issues. Because outside of that, Polyphony deliver quality goods.

In some way, their ability to delivery quality goods is tied with their time management issues.

It would take a fundamental restructuring of the development/test/research process to address the time management and you may very well lose their ability to develop quality goods because of that.

I still prefer GT series over Forza. Cars just feel more real while driving GT5 (I use a steering wheel all the time). I bought and sold Forza 3 shortly after I bought and been happy with GT5. GT6 will likely be my last PS3 game purchase but it will be a nice one.

I was a big GT fanboy before. But GT 5 was a disaster. Dropping as low as 17 frames per second in some areas and unable to maintain 60 frames per second the vast majority of the rest of the time: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digit ... h-analysis You can't have realistic physics when your framerate is dropping down to nearly being a slideshow.

A lot of the cars I've owned or driven over the years are available in Forza 4. I can tell you they handle about as close in the game to real life as the current consoles will allow. Even the Nissan LEAF in Forza 4 feels exactly like it does in real life. Gran Turismo's physics go out the window as the framerate drops and the cars still handle about as bad as they did back in GT3.

The newest installment of the world's best-selling racer is due by year's end.

Of which year?

In truth, I wish I was kidding. I remember significant delays for 3 and 4, and 5 was so late that by the time it came out I'd long since given up waiting. It's been a fun series, but at this point I don't know why they insist on announcing anything about it before it's actually on its way to the stores.

Have they fixed the loading issues? I hated how long it took to go from one section to the next in the menus. Over time that caused a lot of frustration and it probably made me play GT5 a lot loss than I would have otherwise.

Moving between different sections of the menus and back home should be almost instantaneous.

This is just pure marketing to get Sony sell as many PS3 before PS4 comes out.

Dream on if you believe GT 6 will come this year.

It's also stupid, instead of just benefiting from the extra graphics they can push in the PS4. PS 4 will long be released when GT6 hits the stores.

One of things I would like to see in GT6 are:

1. Better AI. Drivers are stupid.2. Better card physics to closed to the real cars3. Destruction. What is the point of racing a 100,000$ car in a game if when you crash it, nothing happens. This is what makes the game completely unrealistic. Its not because you are supposed to crash them, because it just happens, sometimes you will do a mistake and crash, and this is what is most fun about this simulators, see how you car is damaged. And this damage should be persistent, this means you should have to repair or buy a new car, even in online games.

Birds of Steel has done this very nice with their planes. You can see damage on all your planes and need to repair them to use them again. This makes a game come alive because you care about that digital thing more as the real stuff. For all others, there is still always arcade mode.

More games need to do this right here. Reward those who have stuck with the series and purchased other games from the series. Watching all my Dance Central 1 tracks transfer over to my copy of Dance Central 2 was a very happy moment for me. I love the idea of rewarding those who stick with a series.

Kudos to them. This is a very pro-customer choice! These are the kinds of decisions that make me consider switching to Playstation for the next generation.

My biggest fear with the next Forza Motorsports is that they will reduce the number of cars available in the main product and choose instead to include them in DLC packs at additional cost. They did it with Forza Horizons and I really worry that the writing is on the wall for the next FM.

I bought a PS3 on the strength of GT4, then waited years for GT5 (which meant I spent much of my time as a PS3 owner playing GT4 on a PS2 slim). However, between GT4 and 5, I bought an Xbox and built a PC gaming rig, so the PlayStations have been long since Craigslisted.

Despite the nostalgia, I have no plans to return to the user interface hell of Sony products. |-:

I can't believe how nobody has complained about the lack of cars that didn't come over from earlier versions of the game. Lots of cars are missing.

And don't get me started about how some car manufacturers have only four cars and the four cars that they have are some of the lamest cars that company made. What is up with that? Come on, give us more and better cars.

The timing of this launch seems really wierd though. I'd have thought it would be a ps4 launch title, and maybe it will be announced as a dual launch later once Sony starts building up the PS4 marketing. Announcing it so close to release at least makes me think it'll come out this year, rather than the vague promises of the earlier titles.

I've been on the fence with GT5. I loved GT1,2 and 3; but I hated 4 (sold it to a friend for a chipotle burrito). I've tried to like GT5, but I feel more like I'm grinding away, and I can never spend more than an hour playing it.

I've been on the fence with GT5. I loved GT1,2 and 3; but I hated 4 (sold it to a friend for a chipotle burrito). I've tried to like GT5, but I feel more like I'm grinding away, and I can never spend more than an hour playing it.

It is odd that they're releasing this right before the PS4.

I agree. I think it is the combination of the smooth Jazz music and all the loading. Navigating menus seems a chore and I find myself getting sleepy.

Let's say when you are car shopping. Buy one car, go through the process and then you are sent back to the main menu. Rinse and repeat while the Jazz beckons you for a nap...

This is crazy, right? Releasing your premier, exclusive racing game on your last generation hardware during the launch window of your new platform? I understand they're trying to avoid delays, but this just seems so strange.

For reasons that are entirely selfish, I hope MS/Turn 10 does the same thing with FM5, so I can get a little more use out of my 360 with the FM series. But I realize that MS makes decisions somewhat more logically than Sony.

I dropped off the GT map after GT2, if not the gaming map entirely.

In the time since, these games have become much prettier, and lifelike, but fundamentally, if the physics and AI can't back the pretty pictures, then it's mostly futile. Did GT ever progress beyond the "rolling obstacle" opponent model in single player mode?

I've mostly enjoyed FM4, but wish there were more tracks to explore. Understandably, it's much, much easier to model a car, but as long as there's a decent variety of them, I'm happy. The whole car trade/paint/AutoVista thing I've used maybe a grand total of 10 minutes.